


Remember The Wanting (And All We Endured)

by anniebibananie (alindy)



Series: not with a bang but a whimper [2]
Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Apocalypse, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, F/M, Modern Era, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-11
Updated: 2017-08-18
Packaged: 2018-12-14 06:10:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 20,754
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11777103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alindy/pseuds/anniebibananie
Summary: The plague comes out of nowhere. It infects and destroys, and suddenly in the span of days Arya is no longer sure of the world around her. All she wants is to get to Bran, but she can't do that without the help of someone she never would have thought would be by her side—Gendry Waters. Together, they take on the new normal.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first gendrya fic! It takes place in the same universe as I Know All What I Do (my jonsa fic), though that fic takes place two years after this one. I'd really love to hear your opinions on whether I got the gendry and arya dynamic right or not! I really hope you all enjoy <3

                                                             

* * *

* * *

Arya hated running late, but it wasn’t exactly her _fault._ She had stayed up so late finishing her essay she had only gotten an hour or two of sleep, and then she had woken up—bleary and slow. There was no way she was going to be able to pay attention to her Ethics teacher drone on and on without some sort of caffeine.

So, even though this meant she was cutting it way too close, she shifted from foot to foot as she waited for her coffee at the bustling counter.

“One grande caffe americano,” the barista called out, setting the coffee down before moving to work on the next drink.

Arya stepped forward and reached anxiously for the cup, cut off at the last minute by another hand. It was broad and callused, and she trailed her eyes from the hand, up the veiny arm, to see his back retreating.

“That’s my drink,” she said. Her words were maybe a little sharper than she intended, but she was angry and tired and stressed. She was always a little sharp, she would be the first to relent. Being soft had always been Sansa’s thing. She should call her, she thought suddenly, they hadn’t talked in awhile.

The man turned toward her and raised his eyebrows, his lip half twisting up in amusement. His inky black hair was haphazardly pushed off his forehead, his blue eyes pulsing with humor, and he looked down at her from a height taller than her, amused by this little girl firing words.

“Pretty sure it’s mine,” he said followed by a swig of the drink to prove it.

Arya’s eyebrows pushed together and her lips pursed. Who did he think he was? Frustration boiled in Arya’s stomach, and it was only made more furious by the way he seemed amused by the whole situation.

“Grande caffe americano!” the barista spoke over the hum of music in the background.

The man tipped his head. “ _That’s_ your drink.”

By the time Arya had grabbed the cup and turned back around, his back was already retreating through the front door and down the street. She scoffed. “ _Dick.”_

* * *

“I thought I was going to be late,” Arya said as she fell down into her usual seat. The lecture room was a little less filled than it normally was, but it didn’t strike her as odd. With a class this early, it was always a little empty. Far stranger was that, despite it being five minutes past the starting time, was the fact that her professor was nowhere to be found.

Mycah shrugged, slipping further down into his seat. He fared as well as Arya did in the mornings, which was why they got on in the class anyhow. Neither was at all sure why so many people were _excited_ to discuss ethics and morality at seven in the morning.

Arya took a sip of her coffee. “Did we get an email saying class was cancelled?” She pulled out her phone and began swiping through it. “Because if I rushed my ass here just for there to be no class…” The threat died on her lips as the classroom door flung open.

It wasn’t their teacher, though, just another girl from the class. She looked panicked, eyes roaming the front of the classroom until she spotted the remote control that belonged to the antiquated TV hanging from the wall.

“Are you alright?” someone asked from the front, and the girl looked back with wild eyes. Arya wasn’t sure she had ever seen someone with eyes like that up close and in real life before.

“You guys haven’t seen anything, have you?” she said. “It’s playing everywhere. I saw it on my way here, but—”

The TV buzzed to life, and the girl whipped around, words forgotten somewhere in the air. A woman in a crisp suit and billowing yellow hair looked crossly into the camera as she spoke. “—deaths have yet to be specified, but the amount so far has been known to be insuperable. There is no known causes, and whether it is transferable through the air or direct contact has yet to be identified. At this time, the CDC recommends staying isolated for your own health and safety until a cure can be found and distributed.”

The girl dropped the controller and rushed out of the room. Voices spurred back into action, the room seeming to blow up as people collected their things.

“Fuck this,” Arya said as she threw her backpack over her shoulder. “See you around, Mycah.”

He grumbled something back, and she gave a wave over her shoulder as she jogged down the stairway. How could something appear so fast without warning? There hadn’t been any news at the coffee shop, and everything had seemed pretty ordinary on her walk to class. Maybe a little more hectic than normal, but nothing entirely bizarre.

As she exited the building, though, it was clear the news was beginning to spread. A group of people surrounded the TV’s on display in the front window of the communications building, and she stopped to watch. It was a different news station, and clips flashed as a voice spoke over them.

“There’s no rhyme or reason to who exactly is affected. Opening symptoms look much like a cold, but they’ll progress much faster. After sore throat and runny nose, fatigue, and congestion hit, the infected will transition to more severe symptoms. Bloody nose or blood present when coughing, loss of feeling in the lower limbs, extreme sinus pressure are just a few of the newly emerging symptoms that can accompany what has been dubbed by medical professionals as the X Flu and by others… as a 21st century Plague.”

Arya felt frozen in place as she watched the images flashing across the screen. There were so many people flooding hospitals and too many body bags. They were piling up. It didn’t feel real—it felt like something that happened in a movie or in a country far, far away. She hoisted the backpack further up her back and turned to go to her dorm.

Some of the dorm rooms had doors left open, things haphazardly packed or discarded. That seemed a little irrational to Arya, but her steps increased in pace as she went back to her own room. Luckily, her door was still shut, and she shuffled through her pack to find her keys.

“Holy shit,” she said.

Her roommate, Beth Cassel, was laid out on her bed looking halfway to the grave. Her curly, auburn hair spread around her like a halo, and it contrasted heavily against her pale, sickly skin. Redness surrounded her eyes and her nose, and every time she sniffled it was followed by a groan.

“I’m sorry, Arya,” Beth said in the mildly polite tone she always spoke in. “I don’t know what took over, but I’m feeling so crummy.”

Arya shut the door behind her and went to sit at her own bed. “Have you been watching the news at all?”

Beth shook her head pathetically. “No, I’ve barely been able to stay awake. Everything hurts.” She started coughing, her whole body wracking with the breaths. When she pulled away her hand, it was covered in blood. “This is disgusting.”

She didn’t know, Arya realized. She had no idea about anything that was going on, and Arya wasn’t sure she wanted to be the one to tell her roommate that she might just die. That was, if she believed everything happening on the news. It still _felt_ so unbelievable _._

They had never been all that good of friends, but she was a fine roommate. An ideal person to share space with if you had to. Arya didn’t want to just _leave_ her hacking up blood on her bed with a wave over her shoulder. It felt too cruel.

“Here,” Arya said as she picked up a hand towel she had meant to wash when she did laundry last weekend. Using her water bottle from her desk, Arya soaked it and cleaned Beth’s hands off. “Do you want some water?”

“You don’t have to take care of me, Arya,” she said. “I’m sure I’ll be feeling fine after a night or two.”

Arya’s instincts told her she probably shouldn’t even stay in this confined space with Beth, but her rare sense of sentimentality got the best of her. “I’ll get you some water, okay? I’ll just be a few minutes.”

Beth sighed into the blankets on her bed. “Thanks.”

A few seconds later as Arya stood outside her doorway, water bottle in hand and thoughts whirling, she clamored for her cellphone. “Shit,” she cursed as she waited for the contact screen to appear. She clicked on dad and waited for the phone to ring, but instead it went straight to voicemail. Panic rose in her stomach, and she clicked on mom, but that didn’t go through either.

Her feet began to work again, and she walked down the hall to get some water as she tried both her parents again. Nothing changed, and she called Bran next.

“Arya,” he said with a sigh as he picked up after a single ring. “Are you sick? Everything is insanity here, and I can’t get through to any of our family.”

“I’m fine,” she said. Her body was still vibrating with the anxious energy that had been pooling inside of her since seeing Beth laid out on the bed, but at least she wasn’t entirely disconnected. She was grateful to at least have someone. “I can’t reach anyone else, either, but I’ll keep trying. Are you feeling any symptoms?”

“No, me and a few other people have quarantined ourselves. It’s been violent, Arya, some students started freaking out and looting all the classrooms.”

Arya balanced the phone between her shoulder and ear as she capped the water bottle before walking back to her room. Someone ran past her in the hallway, nearly knocking into her, and she stumbled into the wall. “I’ll come to you, okay? If anything happens, just know I’ll come up to you, and we’ll figure something out. You can survive there, right?”

“Yes,” he said with surety. “I promise I’ll be here. You have to be safe, though, Arya. It’s not just my campus where stuff has gotten chaotic, the news has been showing a lot of riots. Some people have gotten sick so suddenly they died right on the road.”

Arya took a deep breath, a million plans already rattling around in her head. “I’ll be safe, but it might take me a little extra time to get to you. Stay with people you trust.”

“I will Arya, and–” The words fell sharply to silence, and she looked down at the phone screen to see the call had cut out. She pushed her way into her room as the conversation continued to tumble in her head, and when she looked up Beth wasn’t moving.

“Beth?” Arya asked, moving to the side of her bed. Her lips were coated in blood, slightly ajar, and her eyes closed. For all practical purposes, she looked dead. Arya took a step forward and pulled the swiss army knife from her pocket she usually had by her side (a Christmas present from Robb), bringing it below her dainty nose.

She wasn’t breathing. Arya stowed the knife and brought her fingers to Beth’s neck, but that came up empty, too. Her roommate was dead. If Arya wasn’t entirely convinced in the disease before, she certainly was now. Getting to Bran felt heavy and important on her chest.

Moving as quickly as possible, Arya removed her spirals and pens from her backpack and stuffed it with essentials. A few changes of clothes, her pepper spray and swiss army knife, her full water bottle, and finally the slim stack of family photos that usually sat in her desk drawer.

Something about leaving Beth on her bed in a locked room felt wrong to Arya, so she wrapped her up in her bed sheet and dragged her into the hallway. Leaving a note on the top of her covered body, she said a small goodbye to the girl she only barely knew. It still felt wrong, but she didn’t have time to think about that. Arya closed her dorm room and went on her way, shoving her hair into a baseball cap and heading out.

If she was going to get anywhere, she was going to need to get her car. The only problem? It had been in the shop for the last two weeks. Arya plugged a singular ear bud in, patted her pocket to feel her swiss army knife securely at her side, and began the trek across town.

* * *

It took longer to get to the autoshop than she had expected, mostly because Bran hadn’t been lying when he said the world was quickly delving into chaos. In an attempt to avoid the majority of it, she was left saying to the side streets and alleyways. Arya wasn’t one to back down from a fight, but she also understood the necessity of speed and discretion.

The auto shop was far enough on the outskirts of town to be removed from the majority of the anarchy, and Arya slipped through the side door after seeing the main garage door closed up. There had been a few windows broken into, but the shop clearly didn’t hold that much appeal. There were only a few cars held inside, and most of them in different levels of disarray.

It was dark as she stepped inside, the only light being what fluttered through the high windows and the upper half of the garage door. The space around them looked vaguely covered in shadows, and Arya searched through for her car before spotting it in the back.

“Shit,” she muttered as she saw it propped up. Arya knew a few things about cars (she could fix a flat tire herself and had actually enjoyed learning how to change the oil when Jon had taught her), but she was pretty sure she wasn’t going to be able to get it in working order.

There were a few other cars, though, and she figured if it really came to it she could just test them all out and take another. She’d prefer her own, obviously, but beggars couldn’t be choosers. The world was turning to shit outside, and all she wanted was to figure it out with at least her brother by her side. Cell service had gone down surprisingly quickly—there would be no contacting any of the other members of her family.

A clatter of metal against the concrete floor echoed around the tall space, and Arya gripped onto her swiss army knife even harder. She was really going to need to find a new weapon for the sake of safety.

Another sound came from around the same area, and Arya creeped around the rusted pickup truck to get closer to the source of the noise. If Arya was going to have to potentially fight, she wanted to have the upper hand at the very least.

There was enough light for Arya to tell it was a _who_ , but not enough to tell who exactly. Arya took another cautious step forward and held out her knife. “Who are you?”

The figure stilled and turned around. Facing her meant stepping into light, and Arya could see the dull outlines of him. She gasped.

“You!” she said.

The man from the coffee shop stood in front of her—a little more weighed down, maybe, but still visibly him. The only visible sign the day had shifted so drastically was his mussed hair and darting eyes. A small chuckle released from his lips. “Me.”

He might have been as asshole, but Arya felt pretty sure taking her coffee wasn’t a prerequisite to murder. She lowered the knife to her side, which caused his shoulders to relax, and eyed the scene. He was holding a wrench in his hands, and oil streaked across his arms.

“You can fix my car?” she asked.

His eyebrows scrunched together for a second. The conversation jump had set him off-kilter and he was finding his way back to solid ground. “I work here.”

“My car is back there,” she said with a point of the finger. “I’m going to need it to get out of here.”

The man squinted into the darkness in the direction of Arya’s car, tilting his head as he contemplated it. “Yeah, there’s no way we’re gonna get her running in time.”

Arya raised the knife back up, pointing it in his direction. “That’s not an option.”

He raised his hands up in surrender and took a miniscule step back. “You’re not really going to gut me, are you? I wish I’d known you were so violent when I took the coffee.”

Arya grumbled—no words, just a guttural sound—and pocketed the knife. “I can’t _not_ leave. I have to get out of here, so are you going to help me or not?”

“Help you?” He laughed a little, looking back toward the rusty truck Arya realized he must have been working on. “You sure don’t know how to ask things nicely, you know that?”

“That wasn’t an answer.”

“You didn’t say _please,_ ” he teased, wiping his hands against his jeans as he stood back up. “I didn’t know someone so small could have so much rage.”

“You want me to take the knife back out?”

He scoffed. “Yeah, because you’re going to kill me with a swiss army knife.” Arya’s hands tightened by her side, and her jaw followed suit. The man wiped away sweat at his forehead, finally seeming to pause to sweep his eyes over her. “I’m fixing the car up to get out of here myself, I can take you where you need to go.”

“Why would you do that?” she asked, crossing her arms.

“For someone who was begging for my help, you don’t seem all that keen to take it.” He shrugged, pocketing the wrench and bending down to the rest of his tools. “Maybe I just like playing knight in shining armor.”

Arya came to his side, bending low and offering a hand to help. His eyes met hers with the uptilt of a questioning eyebrow, but he shifted the tools to her and slid back under the car.

“I _don’t_ need a knight in shining armor.”

The sounds of screeching and tools stopped for only a second before his voice echoed back. “No, I reckon you don’t.”

* * *

Arya slammed the car door and threw her pack into the backseat. Her heart tightened as they pulled out of the garage. She had worked summers at her dad’s company to afford the car all on her own, no help from anyone. Now she had to leave it behind and go off with a stranger. Maybe when the world righted itself she would come back and get it.

The man next to her drove with ease, despite the insanity roaring around them. Someone in town threw a rock at their window, and Arya flinched as he sped up. “I don’t know your name,” she said out of the blue, the thought striking her.

His lip tilted up at the corner in amusement. Arya couldn’t seem to get a read on him—parts of him seemed hardened, and yet there was something soft, almost kind present as well. She shook her head, looking back out at the window as she waited for a response. There wasn’t any point or need to dwell on boys who were just means to an end.

“I’m Gendry.”

“Gendry?” she asked as she looked back toward him. Her eyes trailed his face, eyebrows scrunching together. “You don’t look like a Gendry.”

“Yeah? What do I look like to you then?” Always with that amusement. It bubbled underneath Arya’s skin in irritation—she wasn’t some small, little girl he could make fun of.

“I don’t know, but not _that._ ”

“Like you have any right to talk with a name like _Arya._ ”

“And how do you know my name?”

The tilt of his lips grew, turning into a full blown smile. “It said it on your coffee cup.”

The car nearly swerved off the road when she slapped his arm. The way he laughed in response only made it worse.

* * *

The phones had been down for a few hours, and Arya expected the TV reports had stopped as well. None of the radio stations programmed in the car worked, either, and so Arya and Gendry sat in static-filled silence.

Gendry didn’t say anything when Arya slammed it off; he just kept driving. Which was taking more effort than Arya expected he had been anticipating. The highways were packed and frustratingly slow-moving. Cars were pushed to the side of the road, and Arya couldn’t help herself from looking to see if there was someone dead behind the wheel each time they passed.

A few cars attempted to speed through, which resulted in a few accidents and pile ups. The slow speed left Arya’s heart beating, but it was better to at least be in the refuge of _something._ Otherwise, it was outside. Which Arya wasn’t quite ready to face, actually.

It was fine for a few hours of driving, and as they sped through the highway it seemed the amount of cars became fewer and fewer. The day finally shifted to night with violent colors. The cars in front of them slowed to a standstill, and this time there was no movement. Something exploded a few cars up, and Arya’s body jostled with the sight of it.

“Shit,” Gendry said, looking between the expansive fire and Arya. Another loud explosion appeared in a firework of flames, screams and cheers following. “We need to get out of here.” He looked behind him, but there was too many cars and blocks to move. More screams and cheers echoed outside.

“We’re all going to die anyway!” A voice bellowed through a microphone. Sounds of glass shattering and more fires starting was loud enough to easily hear through the car window.

“We’re going to have to go on foot,” Gendry said finally as the cheers and crashes got closer. A few other people were fleeing the cars around them, and he reached back for his bag.

There were other things he had packed into the back of the car, but there would be no time and no place to save them. He shoved as much as he could fit into the confines of his hiking backpack.

“Do you know how long it will take to get to fucking Washington?” Arya exclaimed, watching his movements with wide eyes. “We can’t walk there.”

Gendry halted and leaned forward. “Well, if you have other ideas now would be a great time to enlighten me. I’m sure as hell not staying in this car while assholes with molotov cocktails walk around outside. But be my guest, not like you’re my responsibility.”

Arya groaned, but grabbed her backpack from the back. She couldn’t believe today. None of it. This morning she had been grabbing coffee, this afternoon getting into a car with a stranger, tonight trying not to die at the hands of looters and lunatics. She was running into the fucking _forest_ , and Arya would laugh if she wasn’t so angry.

“You have enough energy to walk for a bit?” he asked, looking down at her.

After hours of looking at him in the car, she had forgotten how far she had to look up when they were standing side by side. She wasn’t sure what she had expected to happen, but she had almost thought without the car keeping them forced together, he would be long gone by now.

For most of her life Arya had been fine being on her own and doing her own thing. She liked to think of her and her family as a pack, but none of them had problems being the lone wolf every once in awhile. Maybe Sansa, Arya would reconcile, but the rest of them were fine facing tasks alone. A part of Arya thought going with Gendry might just be a hindrance, someone to slow her down. It might be nice, though, to have someone by her side just in case.

The decision warred within her. Finally, she looked up and nodded. Taking a few steps forward, she looked behind her and waved him on. “The real question is whether you’ll be able to keep up.”

He laughed again, in that same sort of amused tone she was growing too used to. Leaves crunched underneath his feet as he jogged to catch up.

* * *

“Would you stop flopping around?” he asked.

Arya groaned and turned her head to see him lying a few feet away. The forest was louder than normal, or at least it felt like it. The bugs chirped and the wind whistled through the trees, and Arya was almost certain she could hear the full moon light the sky. It was enough, more than enough truthfully, to set her completely on edge.

They’d only stopped when both of them could really no longer move their feet, and even then both of them had felt weary about lying down. There was no way to know who or what was also creeping in the woods.

“Just go to sleep,” she grumbled to him.

Even a few feet away, she could see the way his eyebrows came together at the comment. “That’s what I was saying to you.”

Arya paused, shifting her gaze from the side of his face to the night sky above them. They hadn’t eaten much tonight, but in the future they would need to set up camp. Find food before the limited stores shoved in their backpacks left them starving.

“A day ago we were sleeping in beds,” she said, shifting her eyes back to him. “You really had no one you were leaving behind?”

She tried to read the planes of his face as he contemplated what he was going to say. Arya had never been that good at reading feelings, though. She was more likely to respond with a joke to laugh it off, a punch to the shoulder and a stupid word of advice. It took a certain person for her to connect, it was why she barely had a handful of friends at college. Even then she wasn’t sure she would call them that.

His face looked blank then flashed for the briefest moment with anger. “No. No one. We don’t all have families worth crossing continents for.”

If Arya was better with words and sentiments, she might have apologized for bringing up the sore topic. She wasn’t, though, so she didn’t know what to say at all. Her family was worth finding. She'd search endlessly through chaos for them. Even if she had no idea whether anyone but Bran was still alive, hell, maybe _he_ wasn’t even still alive.

It wasn’t like there was much she was leaving either, truthfully, but at least she had something she was moving _toward._ Gendry was just along for the ride.

Arya flopped away so she didn’t have to stare at the moonlight on his features. “We have to get up early, we should try to sleep.”

Gendry groaned. “I already _said_ that.”

* * *

Arya had never felt luckier to be on the west coast than she was then, walking all day despite it being the start of December. Within the first day her and Gendry had been forced to face the thick of a superstore just to get better jackets, food, and weapons. They’d come out with two new sweatshirts, a few boxes and cans of food, and two knives. Gendry had grumbled about not being able to find a gun, but Arya remarked that it wasn’t like he probably even knew how to use it anyway.

“You’re not James Bond,” she had joked, though the words came out a little steely. It didn’t seem to bother Gendry, though, who had started to grow accustomed to her temperament.

“And you’re not a samurai,” he said, watching her twirl her knife in her hand.

“Just wait until I get my hands on an actual sword,” she said, slicing the knife through the air. “Then you’ll see.”

“I’m sure I will.” He scoffed, but when he looked at her there was the spark of something else. Respect, maybe. Admiration. Arya shrugged it off and swiped through the air again.

* * *

“It’s getting dark,” Gendry said two days later (two _long_ days later). “We should set up for the night.”

Something cracked, followed by a squeal, and they both halted at once. Arya made eye contact with Gendry, reaching for the knife at her side and taking a cautious step forward. Another crack of a branch and crinkle of leaves came, and Arya stepped toward the sound. The knife was held slightly in front of herself, though she figured she’d be better at fighting someone off with her bare hands than she probably would be with the knife.

A figure appeared from between the trees, and Arya could feel Gendry stiffen behind her. The boy didn’t see them at first, his eyes too focused on the ground in front of him, but when he looked up he stumbled and fell back in shock.

“Lommy!” he screamed behind him before turning back around and putting his hands up in front of him. “Don’t hurt me, I swear I come in peace.”

When Arya looked back at Gendry, she wasn’t all that sure what she expected to see. Him smiling, however, was not quite it.

“What?” she asked, her voice weighed down with exasperation.

He waved his arm in the boy’s direction. “He’s not going to hurt us. He couldn’t if he tried.”

Arya sighed and slipped her knife back into the loop of her jeans. “You mind sharing your camp for the night?” she asked. “We’ve been walking all day.”

The boy scrambled to his feet, nodding repeatedly. A little rotund, short, friendly honestly. Arya wasn’t sure how she had thought he could ever be a threat in the first place. It had just been days since she’d seen anyone but Gendry. Everything was becoming a shadow in the night. “Not a problem. I just made us some food, plenty to go around.”

“Great,” Gendry said, stepping forward with an outstretched hand. “I’m Gendry. This is Arya.”

“Arry? What kind of name is that?” he said, eyes scrunched together.

“Arya,” she said, louder, more dictated. “And what’s _your_ name if mine’s such a problem.”

“You can call me Hot Pie,” he said, motioning with his hand for them to follow him through the woods. A fire flickered between the trees, and as they stepped closer Arya could smell food warming over the fire. Her stomach rumbled angrily. “This is Lommy.”

The boy he motioned to was practically the physical opposite of him. Thin and blonde, not enough of him to fill out his frame. He gave a little wave, like it wasn’t strange at all that two strangers had appeared out of nowhere to sit around their fire.

Arya noticed the stew cooking over the heat of the flames and stepped forward, picking up an empty can and scooping herself some of the mixture. Her and Gendry had been surviving off of granola bars and cold, canned food. This was practically a delicacy.

“Yeah, help yourself. We’ve already eaten,” Hot Pie said. He fidgeted for a minute, waiting until the two new arrivals were settled on the ground eating before he said anything else. “Where are you two going?”

Arya and Gendry shared a look. It had never become more apparent to her that it was the two of them on the same team now, against whoever they came across. It sent a strange feeling through her chest.

“We’re heading north,” he finally said. “Moving toward family.”

Arya nodded at him in approval, and he sent a half smile back at her.

“You two together?” Lommy asked. “How long?”

Arya snorted, covering her mouth in fear that the stew would come spilling out. “We’re not…” A few giggles took over, and Gendry gave her a look that was a mixture of exasperation and amusement. “We’re friends.”

He seemed almost a little surprised, but he turned back toward the two boys and nodded. “Friends.”

“We’re going north too, toward my family. You’re welcome to hike with us if you want.” Hot Pie shifted, scratched at his neck, and sent a little smile. It was like he was a little uncomfortable with every movement he made, as if he was waiting for the other shoe to drop. A mean word to come at him. Arya felt the littlest bit of pity for this boy trying to make his way through this suddenly harsh world.

Lommy looked at the two of them, scratching his nose. “He means you two look like you can take someone in a fight, and we’re hopeless.”

Gendry chuckled, and Arya felt her lips tilt up a little bit at that.

“Defense in exchange for food,” Gendry said. “Doesn’t seem like that bad of an offer.”

Arya felt anger swell in her stomach, even as she tried to push it down. It wasn’t _at_ Gendry, but the thought itself. All she wanted was to get back to Bran, maybe try to find the rest of their family— where was Jon and Sansa and Robb, Rickon and her parents—and two boys like Lommy and Hot Pie were going to be a strain on time and resources.

But they were good people, and a part of herself felt bad about leaving them in the dust. Defenseless boys with idealistic hopes of getting back to their own family. It would only be a few days, a week maybe with them. Then they would be free and back on their way. It was already slowing them down to try to stick to woods and trees to avoid people and the danger of city, it couldn't be that much worse for them to tag along with these two boys. 

Her and Gendry were a they, she realized. It never seemed to stop striking her as strange despite it only being be a couple days since they had partnered up. Time was a different entity now, though. Hours had seemed so short when she was cramming to finish her essay before midnight or preparing for class, but now they were long stretches of time. An obstacle to survive through to get back with her family.

It felt like a lifetime ago already since Gendry had stolen her coffee. That Arya already felt like a different girl. She was becoming a wolf, adapting to survive through the long journey.

Arya bit the side of her cheek, nodding with the answer. Get to Bran, she thought over and over again like a mantra. Survive and get to Bran, but she stared at Gendry and something else peaked through. He was bent over, scooping from his own can as he ate, hair a mess over his forehead. She didn’t want to leave him behind anymore, and for some reason that thought terrified her.

“Good soup,” she said instead.

Hot Pie beamed like it was the best compliment he had ever gotten.

* * *

Gendry shifted next to the dying fire, turning toward Arya. She opened a single eye at the sound, watching the way he curled up as he tried to get comfortable. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.

“Sorry?” she asked.

He shrugged, nodding his head toward the boys on the opposite side of the fire. “It’ll be a little slower. I probably shouldn’t…”

“It’s fine,” she said. That feeling bubbled in her chest again of anger, but she pushed it down. If she leaned into that feeling, she was scared of who she would become. Forgetting about other people, cutting herself off. Just because the world turned to shit didn’t mean she had to.

“Okay.” He nodded, almost as if it was more to himself than to her. She shivered and he raised an eyebrow. “You look cold.”

“I’m a little cold,” she admitted, though her face filled with frustration at having to admit it.

He looked at her and looked down to the empty space between them, raising his eyebrow again.

“Oh, fuck off,” she said.

He chuckled, shaking his head. “Fine, just trying to offer to keep you from freezing to death.”

“I know _exactly_ what you were trying to do. You keep your hands to yourself.” Arya’s eyebrows scrunched together in aggravation, and that only made him laugh harder.

He closed his eyes, and when Arya shifted a fraction of an inch closer, he kindly kept them shut.

* * *

The next day the weather snapped in the other direction, and Arya had to shift out of her sweatshirt and tie it around her waist as they walked. The sun beat down against their necks, and though Arya was walking just fine, she could tell Lommy and Hot Pie were slowly losing their quick pace.

“Stop drinking water if you’re going to have to pee all the time,” Arya said in exasperation.

“It’s _hot_ ,” Lommy argued.

Arya stepped deftly over a rock. “I don’t _care._ ”

“Were you in school, Arya?” Hot Pie asked. She wasn’t sure if he was switching the topic on purpose or just trying to make conversation. Either option could be equally as likely.

“Yeah,” she said. Her mind shifted to poor Beth, her body lying in a blanket in the hallway outside their dorm room. Mycah, wherever he may or may not be. “You?”

“Nah,” Hot Pie replied, slipping a little against the incline and righting himself. “I was already good at cooking, didn’t see the point in paying to go to school when I could just work. Not like I could afford it anyhow.”

“You’re already really good,” she said.

Gendry looked at her with a tilt of his lips, and she narrowed her eyes at him. She didn’t like the way he looked at her every time she just said something _nice_ , as if it was so completely out of character for her. It was so unendingly irritating.

“Thanks. What were you majoring in?”

Arya shrugged. “Fuck if I knew. I hadn’t found anything that stuck yet. Nothing I liked more than my boxing class.”

Gendry scoffed. “That makes sense.”

“Excuse me?” she asked, tilting her head in his direction.

“Oh, come on. You’ve got so much rage packed in that little body of yours.”

Lommy and Hot Pie found that funny, and Arya shook her head as their laughter took over.

“One day I’m going to leave you all in the dust,” she said.

It didn’t feel like much of a threat anymore, and after a second she found herself laughing right along with them.

* * *

Hot Pie was halfway through cooking them dinner, Lommy making some kind of joke about the way Arya stomped when she was mad, when two figures came through the woods and speared Lommy right through the chest.

Gendry and Arya were up on their feet in a second, Hot Pie scuttering over to their side of the fire, trying to balance the mixture of terror and sadness at the flip of events.

“Wha-what do you want?” Hot Pie asked. His eyes were trained on the blood spilling into the dead leaves like a pool.

Arya took one look at Lommy’s pale face, his broken body, and tightened her hand on the knife. It was two men, one with a smooth head and the other shorter, darker.

“Leave,” Arya said. “Leave now or you’ll regret it.”

The bald man laughed, sharing a look with the darker one and joining together as they looked at the crew of misfits like they were nothing. The anger in Arya’s stomach and chest only bubbled up further, boiling into a fury.

“Hear that, Polliver?” the shorter one asked. “We’ll _regret_ it.”

If there was one thing she couldn’t stand, it was being underestimated.

“Hand over the valuables,” Polliver ordered.

“Cash means nothing now,” Gendry said. It reassured Arya to see him holding his knife, too. To know that, though Hot Pie might be useless, they had a two against two fight if it came down to it.

“That’s not what we mean,” he said. “Food, weapons. They’re ours now, and just be grateful we spared your lives. More of you walking around means less for us.”

“We can’t do that,” Arya said between clenched teeth.

He raised his eyebrow, taking a step forward. “This isn’t a negotiation. This is do what I say or die.”

“Okay, I guess you die then,” she said. Gendry tightened up beside her, but she took a step forward before he could talk her out of this. The puddle of blood pushed her forward, reminded her what this meant.

_This was for Bran. This was for Bran. This was for Lommy and Gendry and— This was for Bran._

Polliver stepped forward blearily, not expecting her to actually do anything, and she launched herself at him before he got a chance to pick his knife back up. Her body crashed into his chest, knocking the both of them to the ground with a loud thunk. He brought his knife up and she punched him hard in the jaw, stunning him for a minute.

Arya could hear grunts and scuffs coming from behind her, so she figured Gendry had jumped in after her. Polliver sliced her arm, but she’d moved quick enough to not have the knife cut too deep. It was clear he wasn’t much more skilled than she was, if anything she was more agile and prepared than him.

He pushed her off of him, twirling so he held down her arms now. She kicked up to release her leg and kneed him, twisting them back over again. With a grunt, she brought her knife up quickly and stabbed him in the chest. His eyes widened, and having lost his knife in the scuffle, he reached up with his only weapon—his hand clasped tightly onto her throat. Her hand was still free, and she was able to get in a few more stabs, though his hand stayed tight. Finally, his grip loosened and she kicked away from him as she regained her breath.

Gendry was also on the ground, breathing heavily next to the other man who had a stab wound in his neck and a bashed in head. Arya’s eyebrows scrunched together, and she looked to see Hot Pie drop a rock from his hands to the ground in shock at his own action. Gendry crawled over to her, eyes focused on the blood dripping down her arm.

“Meeting you was the worst day of my life,” he said, though his eyebrows pushed together as ripped some fabric off of his shirt haphazardly to wrap around her arm.

Her breaths were ragged, her throat still feeling like it was being gripped tightly. She reached a hand out for a second and held onto his upper arm. Closing her eyes, she felt the moment catch up to her. They had both just killed a man. Lommy was dead. The world was so far from what they knew it to be.

She had killed a man and it hadn’t even felt that hard. That was what scared her the most.

A hand, ragged and callused, cupped her cheek for only a moment. When she opened her eyes, Gendry was already moving back and away. “We can’t eat around dead bodies,” he said. “We can’t sleep here.”

Hot Pie nodded, moving toward his things and packing them back up. He seemed in shock as he moved on autopilot. Looking up from his pack, he stared at the two of them with tears on his cheeks. “We can’t just leave him like that.”

Arya nodded, unsure of what exactly to do with him. Gendry picked up some sticks and laid them around him, turning with a shrug and a questioning look. She nodded again, and moved to cover and surround Lommy with all the branches and logs she could find. She’d never been one much for art, but she figured something that was going to go up in flames didn’t need to look that pretty.

When they were done, Hot Pie was all packed up and held a stick already lit up with flames. “You were a good friend,” he said. When he dropped the torch, more tears leaked down his cheeks.

For the first time since being together, Hot Pie was the first to leave camp and walk into the woods. Arya shifted he bag onto her back, watching the flames flicker into something furious. “We didn’t just cause a potential forest fire, did we?”

“Let’s hope not,” Gendry said, nodding at the fire in a sort of goodbye before stepping away. “Hey, next time you plan on potentially getting us killed, could you maybe send me a warning?”

“Yeah,” Arya said with a scoff, “I’ll text it over to you.”

“Great,” he said with false cheer.

All Arya really wanted to do was scream, so she kept her lips firmly closed instead. Her jaw might hurt later, but at least everything would still be tightly bound within her.

* * *

“This is not a goddamn rom com, so if you even think about splashing me with water I will murder you,” Arya said, slipping off her sweatshirts and tee shirt to wade into the water with her tanktop and boxer briefs. “You know I can do it, too.”

When she looked up she saw him looking at her curiously. He switched his gaze back to the water, clearing his throat. She shook the feeling of his eyes on her away, dipping under the water until all she could see and hear was blue.

But she wondered what his arms felt like wrapped around her, lifting her off the ground in a hug. Keeping her warm at night. She dug herself deeper under water, praying the harsh cold would rearrange her head back to normalcy.

* * *

_Get to Bran. Get to Bran. Get to Bran._

Gendry smiled at her with amusement. He laughed as she pushed him away after a joke.

_Get to Bran with Gendry. Get to Bran with Gendry. Get to Bran with Gendry._

* * *

“Arya, something is wrong,” Hot Pie said.

She dropped the wood down by the fire, and walked over to where he was standing. Gendry lay shivering, wrapped up in his own sweatshirts and the sleeping bag they had procured a few days prior. His hair stuck to his forehead, his nose red and runny as he coughed.

“When did you start feeling like this?” she asked, bending closer.

“A little bit earlier today,” he said with a groan. “I don’t know how it got bad so suddenly.”

Her eyes flashed over his face, trying to reconcile this image of Gendry with dying Beth. She had looked more fragile, more red. But she had also been minutes from death’s door, maybe he was still further away. Maybe he wasn’t sick at all, she contemplated. She _hoped._

“If I really am sick…” Gendry trailed off, and Arya’s eyes scrunched together as he looked up at her. He looked so tired. So defeated.

Scooting closer, Arya reached a hand up to his forehead. It didn’t feel that warm, but what did she know? She wasn’t sure that was even an accurate measurement of a fever. Her chest clenched angrily, afraid, frustrated.

“We’re not going anywhere without you,” she said. “Period. End of story.”

Gendry shook his head tiredly. His hand half reached up, but it seemed to take too much effort and he let it fall back to his side. “You have to get Hot Pie home, and you _have_ to get back to your family, Arya.”

 _You are my family_ , almost bounced off her tongue. She bit her lip and shook her head. “Not without you.” It still felt too vulnerable, but it was leagues better than anything else. His lips quirked up at the corner, and she rose back to her feet. “I’m going to get you water.”

When she got back to her feet, she ignored the red rage that pulsed inside of her. It was like there was something in her—angry, fiery, red and ready—that wanted to take over. The longer they walked, the worse the world got, the more it wanted to take everything from her. She had no idea how to balance who she was and who she was becoming.

She returned with some water and bent toward Gendry, scooting closer on her knees until she had bent his head upward to receive the liquid. He swallowed and coughed, falling back down to the ground.

“Are you still cold?” she asked, though it was pretty clear he was. His body shivered and his teeth chattered. He nodded, and she unzipped the sleeping bag to slip inside.

“Arya, no,” he said as he shook his head. “If I’m contagious…”

She scoffed. “Like anything could take me out.” Arya pushed herself into him, and a sigh released from his lips. Any fight in him was gone as soon as her skin made contact with his, and he pulled her closer.

“So warm,” he said. “But Arya—”

Arya wrapped an arm around him, laid her head stubbornly on his chest. “I’m not leaving you,” she whispered angrily.

His arms clutched her together and the shivering ebbed away. It felt foreign to do this for Arya, the girl who had barely kissed a boy. It had never seemed like much of a necessity, and before that she had been called Horse Face for most of her childhood. A girl who grew up alongside Sansa didn’t expect much from boys. She didn’t expect anything.

This was just for preservation. Without Gendry, Arya was going to have a hell of a time getting to Washington. Being alone used to seem like the safest, easiest option. She wondered when it had changed.

She barely slept. There was too much to think and worry about. When the sun began to peek its head over the horizon, she snuck out of the sleeping bag and back over to the stream for some water. She wasn’t sure how to be the girl who woke up beside a boy in his arms, and it felt too late to learn. There were certain things that simply couldn’t be picked up, Arya thought. Especially by a girl like her.

The water was cold against her feet. It was harsh, it was tough. That, she understood.

* * *

“How are you feeling?” she asked as she poked at the fire despite their lack of need for it. Gendry had stirred enough to sit up, holding tightly onto his head.

“Better,” he said with a groan. “I thought that maybe I had it.”

Arya looked up, watching the way his face moved. Even dirty and sleepy he was still frustratingly attractive, she realized. He brought a hand up to push back his hair and then rubbed over his face. He had stubble now, unable to shave.

“I thought you might, too,” she admitted as she looked away.

It hung in the air—dangerous, heavy. The dead leaves crumpled as he crawled toward the warmth.

“And you stayed anyways?” he asked.

She met his face, feeling unbelievably vulnerable. Feelings were so hard to balance, to understand. She hated how they twisted into things she didn’t like when they were in her hands. She hated how she never knew how to navigate them.

Being alone was so much _easier_ when it came to that.

“I wasn’t going to leave you,” she repeated.

Her chest flared with the way he looked at her. Strangely, this felt like the closest she had ever been to something that felt anything like the stories Sansa used to tell her before bed. It was a ridiculous thought, though, and Arya hated how it hung in her chest. This wasn’t like any of those fairytales—this was a nightmare. Even if it was, Arya had never been princess material. She had never even wanted to be, and she certainly didn’t want to be now. A knight, that was so much more fitting.

“I wouldn’t have left you, either,” he said, clearing his throat. “If that means anything.”

Sansa might have kissed him on the cheek for a comment like that. Beth probably would have told her to give him a hug, grab his hand. She bumped her shoulder with his and looked back at the flames, hiding her smile with her hands.

It meant a lot. She had a feeling he already knew that, though.

* * *

Arya remembered the night before everything changed again like this. A goodbye hug to Hot Pie as his path diverged to get back to his family. A reminder to stay alive. A proposal that if she ever found something worth living for, a place where the future looked brighter, she would find him. Then her and Gendry walked away, just as they had been before they’d even met the other boy.

They camped, sharing a can of green beans. Gendry laid out in the sleeping bag, and when he held out his arm as an offer, she took it. They both felt it—the surprising emptiness, the danger that still sat in front of them.

For once Arya let herself pretend she was a different girl in a different world, and she laid beside him in the confines of a sleeping bag. Then, they woke up. They walked. And everything changed again.

* * *

Gendry heard the sounds before she did, and he grabbed her to hide behind a tree as the sounds of men walking and talking grew louder.

“We know you’re out there!” one shouted. “We ain’t going to hurt you.”

Arya still felt her body tighten despite the placating words. Gendry gave her a shrug and a worried look, like what other option did they have. And they didn’t really. It was clear there were far more bodies out there than they could possibly fight off.

Gendry stepped out first with hands offered up in surrender, and Arya followed (though, she wasn’t going to give in and hold up her hands).

“Put your hands down, boy,” the apparent leader said. He looked ragged and dirty, though clearly not crestfallen. His eye was curiously covered in a patch. “We were about to set up for the night, come join us for some food.”

“We were just on our way,” Arya said as if testing the waters.

A few of them laughed. “We’re not going to hold you captive, but by the looks of you, you two could use a good meal.”

Arya thought about how skinny she had been growing, and the measly dinner they would have had planned for them. Her ribs had begun to peek out through her skin, and though Gendry had been able to keep his muscle packed on, she knew he felt the temptation, too. They shared a look, and she nodded.

“Okay,” he said.

“I’m Beric,” the man said as the other men began to set up camp. “On behalf of the brotherhood, we’d like to welcome you for the night.”

“The brotherhood?” Arya asked, raising an eyebrow.

Beric nodded, unoffended by her skepticism. “We’re a group of men just trying to do some good in the world. Help keep peace, maybe make a camp somewhere in the future to re-establish a home. For now we just travel to do what’s best.”

“That sounds… idealistic,” Gendry offered.

Arya scoured the camp, watching the group of men set up tents and a few pull out pots. They were actually living with equipment, which felt so out of place to the life she had come to know. Her eyes halted as she saw a woman in the corner, watching the space with curious eyes before they landed on Gendry. They halted on his frame for a moment, looking him up and down, before finding Arya’s. Stubbornly, Arya refused to break the contact.

She was lithe with deep red hair spiraling down her back in braids. Somehow, her jeans and bright red top looked classier than everything anyone else was wearing. Certainly nicer than the ratty jeans and beat-up sweatshirt Arya was sporting and the backwards ball cap. She didn’t understand how this woman’s face looked so dirt-free.

Arya opened her mouth to make some kind of joke, but as she turned to Gendry she noticed his eyes on her. She snapped her mouth shut. It shouldn’t hurt this much, she thought. Her chest ached uncomfortably. This had never been the sort of thing she cared about. _Get to Bran_ , she repeated, but it didn’t quell the confusing mass of emotions inside of her like it normally did.

He turned back toward her, bowing his head in slight embarrassment at being caught. “It wasn’t—” he began.

But she didn’t want him to explain what it wasn’t like it mattered. Like he wasn’t checking her out because she was a beautiful woman and her just a horse-faced little girl. “Doesn’t matter,” she said. The words sounded a little short to her own ears.

“Arya…” he trailed off, but it was clear neither of them knew what to say. He shrugged, clearing his throat and scratching at the side of his fate. “We don’t have to stay. We could keep going, make camp for ourselves.”

They could pretend that life wasn’t actually different here, that this didn’t change everything. They’d started living like they were the only two people left in the world, but that wasn’t true. Gendry didn’t have to stay with her because she was his best option, he could do a million things.

Part of her wanted to yell at him to just go, get it over with. People were so often disappointments. If he wanted to ditch her, he should just do it. Another part of her, though, wanted to beg him to stay. To _never_ leave her. They could leave this camp and never look back.

“We need to eat,” she said. “It’s fine.”

Gendry nodded and went off to help the men set up, and Arya watched the red woman’s eyes trail after him like he was a fresh piece of meat. Her hands clenched at her sides.

* * *

Dinner was far better than anything they would have conjured up, and after she helped clean up the dishes, Arya wandered a bit outside of camp. There was a stream nearby, and she sat on a rock that was flat enough to keep her from slipping off. The moon sat high, light streaming evenly through the leaves of the dying foliage. A wind blew past and she wrapped her arms tighter around her knees.

“There you are.” Gendry said from behind her.

Arya scooted over, giving him space to sit down. He wiped his hands against his pants as if they were any cleaner than his own palms.

She grumbled. “Here I am.”

He hit his shoulder against her own. “Why are you grumpy?”

“I’m not _grumpy_.” Though the words felt drowned in a sort of discontent that was palpable. They both tightened up at the thought.

He sighed, wiping a hand down his face. Looking away from the pulsing stream, she turned her head to look at him. His muscles were evident through his henley shirt, and he had cleaned his face up earlier at the stream. His hair, too, was rinsed through.

It had been a silly thought, really, to expect him to never find anything better. She felt unbelievably childish for holding onto it for so long.

“You want to leave,” she finally said. “You can say it.”

“Arya…”

Her eyes narrowed as he finally looked at her, and for some reason it felt like too much to have this conversation sitting down. The indignation pushed her to her feet and coursed through her limbs. “You told me you would come with me.”

He wearily pushed himself up to his own feet, his shoulders slumping. “I’m tired, Arya. It would be nice to fight for something good with people who believe in it. Do something for once in my life.”

“But you… you _said_ you’d come with me.” Her jaw tightened, and so many words sat at the back of her throat. She wanted to say he shouldn't leave her, that he had said he wouldn’t. That she had gotten used to him by her side, that she had _liked_ it. Maybe if she just said it he would understand, would change his mind.

But the idea of him pitying her felt like an even worse situation. It crawled at her skin, and her mouth stayed shut.

“It’s not my family.” He shrugged, like he knew that wasn’t enough either. They both stood, angry and frustrated and unable to say all that sat between them.

“I could be,” she said. The words felt fragile, and she hated that even more than yelling at him. “I could be your family.”

Gendry’s face turned soft for a second, his hand twitching at his side, before he shook his head like the thought was ridiculous. “We’re together out of convenience. You wouldn’t have talked to lowly me if the world hadn’t turned to shit.”

Those words pulled the last bit of fire out of its place in hiding, the vexation lighting her whole body up. Her fingers tingled with it. She wanted to scream. She wanted to punch. She wanted to cry, but only after she had beaten everything in her path first.

“You just want to fuck her,” she spat. “You want to fuck her and play Robin Hood, is that it?”

His eyes narrowed and he took a step forward. “You really think that? After all this time?”

Arya shrugged. She felt like the ugliest version of herself, but she wasn’t all that sure she even cared. “It’s fine, you were slowing me down, anyhow.”

He froze before nodding. “That’s right. It’ll always be about that anyways, right?”

She wasn’t quite sure what that meant, but she wasn’t thinking rationally enough to ask. Taking a few slow steps toward him, she stopped in front of him and reached her arm behind him. His body became rigid at having her so near, and it was clear he had no idea why it looked like she was about to hug him after the lashing words they had just exchanged.

Her hand reached beneath the back of his tee shirt and pulled out the knife she had lent him earlier that was sitting in the belt of his jeans. “This,” she said as she held it between them, “is mine.”

They stood close, the tension and anger and something else sitting between them horribly thick.

“Arya,” he said. The words came out so tender she could feel her heart clench. And yet, they sounded exactly like a goodbye.

 _Please don’t go_ , she wanted to beg. _Please don’t make me leave without you._

“Bye,” she said instead, grasping her bag up from the ground and swinging it onto her back.

“You’re really going to go right now? It’s too dark. At least sleep the night.”

“I’ve got to get to my brother.” The words felt colder than she did. The image of the two of them huddled in a sleeping bag from last night played behind her eyelids every time she blinked. That wasn't her life anymore, it had barely been her life to start out with. For one fleeting moment there had been hope of it, but that was never going to be her path in life. She had monsters to vanquish and quests to be completed.

She was ice. She was steel. She was death.

She walked away and didn’t look back.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for keeping interest and sticking along for part two! I really hope this is everything you could want (or at least, like, most of what you could want)!!

Arya’s feet and legs ached, and yet she kept moving. She needed to get far enough away that she forgot what she left behind, that she didn’t feel the desire to turn around. If she focused on the searing anger inside of her instead of the weathered look Gendry had given her before she left, it was easier to walk. 

One foot in front of the other, step after step, all toward Bran. And as the hours swept by, and the days quickly followed—she did forget it. Her body pushed to its boundaries. Her limbs aching for rest, for home. How good would it be if the world was turned back around and she could pretend none of this had happened at all? If she could sit on the couch alongside her family and fall back into a life she had known in such an easy way? 

The truth sat ugly, ferocious,  _ hungry  _ inside of her. She walked, trying to ignore it was even there at all. 

_ You like it _ , the voice began, but she clasped her hands around the thought and strangled it out of existence. She pushed her shoulders back and kept moving, never letting her eyes travel backward. 

* * *

In an ideal world, Arya wouldn’t have to stop at all. She could walk through the night. She would barely eat, and not waste her time finding water. But her body  _ had  _ needs, even if she was good at ignoring them for days. Alone, she had gotten so used to the silence. She had grown talented at thinking about nothing but her one mission, the only thing she needed to do.

There was no point in killing herself, though, before she got to Bran just because she didn’t want to stop to get food. For a week she was able to survive off of granola bars and refilling her water bottle in streams, a few hours of sleep before waking up and doing it all over again. 

She just wanted to see her brother. She just wanted to remember what this was all for. 

The streets were so thinned of people, that Arya hadn’t seen anyone since leaving the brotherhood. There wasn’t a single sound of another human, certainly no signs of them, as she approached the Costco. It reminded her of those images she had seen flashing across the news all that time ago—the piles of body bags nearly spilling out of the hospital, all those dying people. How many had really lost their lives after it was all said and done? 

Why was she safe when so many else seemed not to be? And if the odds were really so slim, then it seemed so dangerous to hope that her whole family would be together again someday. It was easier to imagine certain people surviving over others, as if they would be better equipped for this. 

The weight of her knife was familiar in her hands as she walked through the open door. She thought about Robb and Jon, probably taking on the world together. Jon, all brooding lines and stiff brow while Robb walked through the remains of their world like a battlefield he had conquered. He’d joke, pulling a smile from Jon’s lips despite it all. 

The aisles were tall and wide, and though they had been pillaged over, there was still a significant amount of food higher up on the shelves. Tiptoeing around, she made her way to the shelves holding snacks first. 

Sansa would hate how so much of her diet was granola bars now. Sometimes, canned vegetables and fruits opened with her knife and plucked out with her fingers. It was just easier, and lighter, to survive off of them even if it never quite filled the insufferable space that was her stomach. For a moment, Arya decided it was most likely Sansa was dead. The idea fed the darkness inside of her, but she plucked it back, destroyed it. Sansa could survive just as well as the rest of them, she decided. She had never much given her sister the benefit of the doubt. 

Arya wondered if there was any dehydrated food. In a place this big, she figured there must be. As she went to check, she passed a crinkled box of Scooby Doo fruit snacks. Her mother used to pack them in Rickon’s lunches, and Arya or Robb would sneak him an extra packet when she wasn’t looking. Before she could think about Rickon with dirt on his brow and and callused, thin fingers, a sound from the back of the store shifted her from her not quite pleasant reverie. 

Maybe before the world shifted she would have thought it was nothing, but she knew better now. Her body was on high alert, and the sound of loud knocks echoed around the massive ceilings and expansive walls straight to her ears. 

In the back there were some shorter shelves, knocked down on one another. A single body sat crushed beneath the molding breads and various boxes of food, and Arya had to tighten her jaw to not shrink away from the stench. 

_ Knock. Knock. Knock.  _

Arya made her way around the fallen aisles, waiting for another knock to direct her where to go when she could no longer hear them. Another one came, and she walked down a small hallway next to what once used to be the meat section. It made her stomach roll to smell it. 

Her heart pounded furiously when she turned the corner to see a man’s face through a small window. His thick eyebrows raised in question, but he didn’t seem surprised to see her. The most disconcerting thing was that he didn’t seem distressed. He pointed a finger down toward the door and mouthed a word Arya could not read from this far. 

The whole situation yelled of some sort of trick. The man must be locked in, it was the only thing that made sense on why he would be talking to her through a window. If he really was trapped, and this wasn’t a trick, she could just leave him. Even with all the things she had been forced to do so far, though, this still seemed out of the question. 

Closer, she could tell his long hair was auburn with a streak of grey. His face looked lean and tired, but there was still something passive about his expression. Like it would be impossible for anything to get to him. 

“A man has been locked in,” he said. Arya quirked her head—not only was the timbre of his voice a surprise, but also the way he spoke. It was like he knew something evident she did not. “If a girl could help, she might make a friend.”

“How do I know you’re a friend worth having?” she asked. 

His lips tilted up at the corner with the question. Arya tried to decipher the emotion; it was clear there was amusement there, but almost as if he was  _ proud.  _ Her stomach felt uneasy. 

“She doesn’t, I suppose,” he said. “In a world like today, though, is it not best to have allies?”   


Biting the inside of her cheek hard, contemplating the offer, she gave him a sharp look. “And how exactly have you been locked in the storage room of a Costco for weeks?” 

He gave an almost imperceptible shrug. “They thought I was sick. I was not.” 

This still felt on the edge of dangerous to Arya, but she couldn’t leave this man locked away. She looked around to see if there was a key left on the ground for the padlock, and when she came up empty she moved toward the office nearby to find something to break or pry it open. Noticing a golf club in the corner, she picked it up and made her way back to the door. 

“What’s your name?” she asked after the first strike. She paused to wipe the back of her hand against her forehead. It was uncomfortably warm in the tight hallway.

“Jaqen H’ghar.” 

Arya nodded and kept on swinging the club against the lock, finally feeling it give after a minute. As the padlock fell to the floor, she took a hasty step back and brought her knife up. 

The man walked out with both hands up. When the door shut behind him, he gave a nod in thanks. The motion almost verged on a bow. 

“I owe you.” 

“You don’t have anything I want,” she said. He reached his hand out for her knife, and she took a step back. 

“Trust,” he said. Though almost every part of Arya’s body was begging her to do the exact opposite, she handed the knife over. Her curiosity got the better of her. 

Luckily, he didn’t turn around to instantly stab her. Jaqen inspected the knife for a second before swinging it artfully through the air. He twisted the knife in his hand, passing it back to his other one, twisting it around like it had no potential to hurt him. And it didn’t, not the way he controlled the blade like it was merely an extension of himself. 

“Someday,” he said, holding the knife back to her, “if you want to feed the darkness and your skill, you can find me. A girl has great potential within her.” 

He walked down the hallway, only looking back over his shoulder with a final nod for the briefest of moments before exiting back into the store. 

“Wait!” Arya ran after him, but as the hallway ended and the wide, open store came into view… he was nowhere to be found. 

Like smoke, like dust. Just another empty promise, she supposed. 

* * *

Two nights later, Arya remembered a memory of her father that had been buried away. The fire began to crackle as she threw some smaller twigs onto it, hoping to build it up. It had been a while since a hot meal, and though Arya was good at ignoring simple desires, even she had moments it became impossible.

Ned liked to try to make as many bedtimes as he could when they were children. Even when work kept him late, he almost always made it in time to tuck them into their beds. To kiss his children on the forehead and give them words of encouragement. 

“You are wolves,” he said still in his suit, though the tie was askew and his shoulders heavy.

At the time Arya and Sansa had been sharing a bedroom; Rickon had just been born, and they were in the process of adding onto the house to accommodate the growth. It had only been a handful of months, maybe a year in the confines of the same space, but somehow Arya could still remember it vividly. 

“Wolves?” Sansa wrinkled her nose. “I don’t think I’m a wolf.”

There was something pleasing about that to Arya. If Sansa wasn’t a wolf, she  _ could  _ be and it would make sense. She was scrappy and fierce. She would take others done with a single bite or pounce. Sansa was suited to towers and magic. Arya was built for destruction. 

“Oh, but you are,” Ned said with a bit of drama. His eyes always lit up when he talked to them like that. He padded from bed to bed, and with each word he tried to get his children to understand how special and incredible they were, how incredible they  _ could  _ be. “Starks survive all.”

“Anything?” Arya asked. She had unburdened herself from the restrictive sheets and jumped on her mattress, howling like a wolf. Sansa squealed, and her father laughed. He had stepped forward to jokingly pounce on her, just to swoop in and wrap his arms around her middle. 

As he laid her back down, he nodded. “Anything. You have steel in your heart.” 

He turned to Sansa, tapping at her chest and pushing long strands of fire hair away from her face. “And you have lead in your bones, my little wolf.” 

“You girls can survive anything,” he said. He kissed both of their foreheads as he backed up to leave. As he stood by the light at the door, his hand hovered over the switch. “Imagine how well you could survive it together.” 

Arya stabbed her knife into a can of black beans a little too forcefully and snapped herself back to the present. The blade cut into her thumb. She flinched before bringing it up to her mouth. Finding a bit of extra fabric in her bag, she wrapped it around the wound and put the can near the flames. 

“You can survive anything,” she whispered to herself. She looked at the ground beside her and wondered what it would be like to have Sansa there. To have Jon. To have  _ anyone.  _

She shook her head, fixating her eyes back onto the flickering flames. “You can survive anything.” 

* * *

Arya heard the man rustling through the woods before she saw him. He made no attempts to soften his steps, and by the time he pushed through the trees to stand in front of her fire, Arya was already up on her feet with a knife held out.

He was massive and bulking. Scarring took up most of the left side of his face, but it was his leer that was far more terrifying. 

“Sit down, little girl. You aren’t going to be able to skewer me.” 

Without warning he set his bag down and sat across the fire from her. A few seconds later he reached over and took the oatmeal she had been trying to cook by the fire. 

“Hey!” she said, standing up to her feet. “That’s not yours.” 

He grunted as he scooped with his fingers from the container. “It is now. Would you sit down? You have plenty of food for yourself.” 

Arya could feel her fingers twitching back toward her knife again. How satisfying would it feel to stab it straight into his chest? Or better, straight into his throat so he would never have to hear him speak again. The calmer part of herself talked her down—wait it out and he’ll leave. You’ll never have to see him again. 

After one last rebellious moment, she let herself fall back to the ground. She pulled out a granola bar and grumpily chewed it in only a few bites. 

Looking up, he wiped at his mouth with the back of his hand. “You like it.” 

She narrowed her eyes and crinkled the wrapper into the fire. “Like what?” She swore her voice could have sliced straight through him, but his face didn’t have any recognition of it. 

“The fight. It’s okay to like it, little girl. Some people are born for it.” 

The fingernails of her left hand dug into her calloused flesh. The fingernails of her right into the handle of her knife. “I’m not a little girl. And I  _ don’t  _ like fighting.”

He shrugged. “Doesn’t matter much to me, but like recognizes like.” Pushing his pack a little to the side, he laid down and rested his head on it before looking back at her. His eyes had a hunger in them that repulsed Arya and yet… she felt like she understood. “Most people waste their whole lives bottling the darkness up. It’s why the world’s such shit now. Finally a playground for all the fuckery they’ve wanted to do their whole goddamn lives.” 

Arya leaned forward on her knees. She could almost feel her skin harden into armor. “And what fuckery is it that you partake in?” 

“Girl,” he said gruffly, flipping over on his side, “it would give you nightmares.” 

It was impossible to fall asleep knowing a stranger sat feet away, but Arya wasn’t particularly fond of the idea of wandering out into the shadow of the woods. It had been hard enough the day before to maneuver, and half-tired with limited visibility sounded like its own brand of hell. 

He stirred after a few hours, and she listened with closed eyes as he creeped over to her bag. For a minute she watched the black of her eyelids and heard his muttered curses, the sound of her cans hitting the ground. Then she reached for her knife and twisted in time to stab his hand into the ground. 

“You  _ cunt _ ,” he said. His face turned stormy and furious. 

“Maybe I do like the fight,” she said. “I might even be better at it than you. You ever come across me again in these woods, and you’ll hit the ground before you even see my face.” 

His claw of a hand grasped over her own on the hilt, and he strangled her fingers as he yanked the knife up and out. Blood spurted over both of their clothes, and Arya reached for the second knife in her boots. Maybe he was more skilled than her, but she knew she was quicker. By the time he had the knife fully in his hand, she had sliced his thigh on the way to standing up. 

“You stupid—”

He stumbled, and she brought the knife back up and planted it in his chest as he tried to right himself. “Stay out of my way.” 

Grabbing her things up as quickly as possible, she stuffed them in her bag and slid the still bloody knife into her pocket. She spared only a glance back at his bleeding chest and bloodthirsty eyes before jogging off into the woods. 

The dark suited her better than she expected.

* * *

Fatigue took over, and Arya lost a whole day to walking in almost entirely the wrong direction. The ugliness inside of her chest grew with every step.

_ You like the fighting.  _ It spoke.  _ You like the power of killing.  _

Bran… her mind whispered. You have to get… 

She kept walking. 

* * *

There was a flicker of something in the woods, and Arya’s body froze with anticipation. A whip of something to her right, then a whip of something to her left. Finally, in front of her, a woman appeared. She was dressed in all black with short, blonde hair and a serious disposition.

“We’ve been expecting you,” she said after a silence that seemed to stretch for days. 

Arya’s eyebrows scrunched together. “Excuse me?” 

The blonde woman nodded for her to follow, turning around in the woods. Arya could forget her and keep going, but her curiosity won. She jogged after her to catch up, and kept the hurried pace she made through the trees. 

“You won’t make it up North without better training,” the woman said. 

“You don’t know me,” Arya replied. 

The woman stopped talking and kept walking. Arya found it irritating, and bit down on her cheek to keep from screaming out. A minute later they stood in front of an old house. It was nearly three stories high, with weathered wood and a chipped blue coat of paint. It looked like it had been picked up from somewhere else and transplanted into the foliage. 

In the doorway stood Jaqen H’ghar. Arya tried to mask the surprise on her face, but she couldn’t hide the shock. This wasn’t real. She must be in some sort of drug-induced state. Things like this did not happen in the world, even a world as fucked as this one. 

“We’ve been expecting you,” he repeated with a wave for her to come in. 

Arya couldn’t think of anything to do but follow. 

* * *

Training was harsh and rigorous. The woman went by Waif, no name needed, and the first night she told her why exactly she needed to stay. The further North you went, apparently the more chaotic it was. The Waif said she had come from Idaho and walked through Washington to get down here, and she was even surprised she had made it out alive.

Something seemed odd about the story, but Arya pushed the disbelief away. There was a roof here. A bed and hot food. Every day she woke up and trained until she couldn’t even feel the muscles in her limbs anymore, and she face-planted into her thin mattress to sleep. Every day the oddness of it seemed to wear off.  _ I can leave at any time  _ turned into  _ One more day.  _

“Feed the beast,” Jaqen said as he sparred with her. “Become it. Who are you, girl?”

“No one,” she recited just the way she had been told to. 

He hit her with a stick, and she recoiled. “Why don’t I believe you?” 

Bran flashed behind her eyelids, and she remember she wasn’t supposed to be here. She was supposed to be travelling North. 

“I am no one,” she repeated through gritted teeth. She sparred back, a few steps forward and then a few back. “No. One.”

He paused and waited as she wiped the back of her forehead with her hand. “Better. When a girl has no name, no attachments, she will become no one. Then she can do as she likes without weights to hold her back.”

_ Jon. Robb. Sansa and Rickon andMomandDad. Mycah. Hot Pie… Gendry…  _ Bran _. _

“A girl remembers,” he said, pulling her from her thoughts. 

With a jolt of anger she pushed forward, slicing her stick through the air. She tried to forget. 

* * *

With every spar of her stick. With every throw of her knife. Every sly smile from the Waif.

_ No one.  _

_ No one.  _

_ Noonenoonenoone. _

She was someone once, right? More than a shell and the throbbing of something dark and vicious? A dull pang of someone?

_ No one. _

* * *

Arya walked down the hall when she heard voices and turned to the right. There a door sat half open, and she crept toward it.

“You caught a few more in the woods today?” one voice asked. 

“Only two. A man and a woman.” 

Creeping closer, she peeked through the open door. Two bodies laid lifeless, while a few more sat in the corner. 

“Why don’t you come in?” 

For a moment, she froze. Then she stepped forward and into the room. Jaqen and the Waif stood around the bodies. For people who looked so even and emotionless almost always, there was something sinister sitting in their faces. Her eyes caught something in the other corner, and she noticed the pile of faces on a table there. 

Arya couldn’t find a reason to explain these bodies and these faces. She couldn’t find anything in herself to  _ want  _ to. 

“A girl is no one,” Jaqen said, “and she is ready to learn everything.” 

Arya shook her head and grabbed out her knife. “A girl is Arya Stark, and she is ready to go find her brother.” 

* * *

There was running and blood. There was fighting, cursing, and sweating. The Waif went down in the nighttime darkness of the forest, but not without slicing Arya open.

She ran and ran. And finally, when she collapsed, she thought about Bran. She looked up at the night sky, the stars twinkling, and passed out to the thought of her arms around him. 

* * *

When Arya woke up, she noticed first the way her back didn’t ache from the hard ground. A hand reached out curiously, and she felt the cushion of fabric. She was actually sleeping on  _ something.  _ The last time she had done that was another life, far enough away it felt hard to imagine in anything but blurry edges and fading memories.

When she tried to sit up, her abdomen ached. 

The door swung open, and Arya shifted her hand to where she had last had her knife and her gaze toward the sound. Her fingers fell comfortably to her side when she saw who it was. 

“Hot Pie,” she said in a confused breath of relief. “How am I here?”

He approached her with a small cup of water and held it up to her lips. “I figure you probably would be able to answer that one better than me.” 

“I passed out in the woods,” she said. “I ran for so long, but then I couldn’t anymore.”

“I was out trying to find some berries,” he said with a shrug. “And imagine my surprise to find Arya Stark passed out in the shrubbery, bleeding out of her stomach. I thought you might be dead.”

“Not today,” she said with a groan as she tried to push up higher. It hurt still, but she couldn’t continue to lay there. “I thought you were with your family.”

He bowed his head, and his curls shook with the movement. “No one is safe anymore, Arya.” 

Coming back from where she had been felt like defrosting. Or emerging from a black and white film into the colored reality. Moving and talking like this… she felt unpracticed. Even then, she could see the grief which hung from his limbs like sad reminders of all that they had lost. 

Reaching out a hand, she gripped onto his forearm. “I’m sorry.”

He shrugged, shaking off the emotion to the best of his ability. “We’re survivors, right? We just keep surviving.”

“We’re survivors,” she agreed. It was the first thing she had said since running that felt undeniably true. It felt right in the way it sat in her mouth and then in the small space. “How did you get here?” 

“It’s a cabin my neighbor used to own. I thought it might be secluded enough to keep me safe. I’m still waiting for you to find me somewhere worth living,” he joked. “Don’t think I forgot that promise.”

Her lip curled up in a friendly way. “It’s a promise. I wouldn’t leave a friend behind.”

“Good.” He nodded, and it was clear discomfort trickled through him. He rubbed at his thighs and then scratched at his arm before finally bringing his eyes back to her. “Where’s Gendry, Arya?” 

She reached her hand out for more water, and Hot Pie dutifully handed it over. Her throat felt painfully dry. When was the last time she had thought about Gendry? 

For a while it had felt impossible to shut it out, but enough miles and distance had made it easier. It was a scab at the back of her mind. Every once in awhile she scratched a little too hard and the blood bubbled, but mostly it healed. In the house she had forgotten everything. It was just her, a shell, and the body she learned to use as a weapon. 

Now it flooded back to her. The way Gendy’s lip twitched up in amusement when she was obviously frustrated. How he laughed, full and deep, every time she teased him. The feeling of lying next to him, huddled for warmth and reassurance. The knowledge that someone was there for you when you weren’t sure how to be there for yourself. 

The good swelled in her chest before being cut down by the way his eyes had looked guilty and tired as she knew the horrible admission that was coming. The anger and, she could admit it now,  _ jealousy  _ as she saw the way he eyed the red woman. The scraped out hollow, empty space of her chest as she walked away. 

Feeling all of that felt like being filled back up to the brim—a reeducation on humanity. She wasn’t entirely sure she wanted it. It would be easier to get back to Bran, though, if she could feel it with all her being. If she was able to hold onto the reason she fought so hard with tightly clasped fists. 

“He’s gone,” she said. Hot Pie’s eyes widened in horror, and she felt the quick need to remedy her words. “He left with some other people we ran into.” 

“Oh,” he said. He nodded, chewed at his lip, and set his determined eyes on her. “You need him, Arya. I don’t know what happened, but you can’t give up on him. You two need each other. You gotta find him.”

She sighed. There wasn’t any point in denying the slick pull of want in her bones. “I wouldn’t even know where to start.” 

“You might not have to start anywhere.” Hot Pie stood up and moved to the corner of the room. When he came back to sit down, he had a platter of baked bread and berries. Hungrily, she reached out for it. “He’s probably already looking for you. Your best bet might be to just keep going.” 

Arya wasn’t sure how to respond to that, so she didn’t. Instead, she took a huge bite of the bread. It was so good she couldn’t help but moan. “This is  _ so  _ good.” 

He beamed. “Thanks.” 

* * *

Arya wasn’t worried about Bran not being there the way she used to be. He was either there or he was dead, and though she desperately hoped the latter wasn’t true, at least it sat in the knowable. Two options. It calmed her to know what she would face.

Her journey had turned into months, and she didn’t even know if the end of it all would bring joy or grief. There was something crazy and powerful in hoping for the best, and yet realizing she could endure the worst. At least she would  _ know.  _ The answer had been a question mark in her head for so long. 

As she walked now, though, she couldn’t help but wonder where Gendry was. There was no straightforward two solutions when it came to that question mark. And yet… the darkness didn’t claw at her. She didn’t drown in it. There still sat a bubble of something bright and shiny, something hopeful, ripe in her chest. 

It felt foreign, and yet it made every step easier. 

* * *

Too often, Arya dreamed of Winterfell. But her dreams were almost always memories, clawing to not be forgotten.

“You’ll have the best first year,” Arya said, reaching up to jokingly pat her brother’s cheek. Catelyn and Ned were packing the last of the suitcases into the car, and they could hear their quiet chatter as they finished up.

Bran rolled his eyes at her but ducked down to give her a hug. “I’ll have to come down and visit you.”

Arya hugged back tightly. When she opened her eyes she could see the expanse of their family home in the background. Chilly but familiar. Every time she left she felt the space of need in her that just wanted to be back—in this comfortable place, with her family. It didn’t deter her from leaving or traveling, there was so much of the world she wanted to see, but it did remind her of all the good she had to come back to. It was reassuring. 

“Maybe I’ll come up and see you. But only after you make some friends, of course. I’ll make sure you’ve gotten in with the good sort.” 

Bran pulled back and watched her with raised brows. “Yes, because  _ you’re  _ so good at picking out friends and keeping them.” 

“I resent that.” Arya slapped his arm, but she laughed along with him. Still laughing as the car pulled out of the driveway, and he waved through the two front seats. It wasn’t like she’d never see him, but it was odd watching him go. 

A week and she’d fly back to school too, and it was easier to do it knowing some of her family would be a bearable car ride away if she needed. She waved, jokingly exuberant, until the car and her family curved down the driveway and disappeared into the trees. 

* * *

Walking went well until she reached a wide river near Portland. Memories flashed easier through her mind than they had in awhile. It made it easier to keep pushing forward,  _ toward  _ something. She missed her brother desperately.

The quickest route was to go  _ across  _ the water, but she realized how tricky that would be. There were few boats in eyeline, and the docks were scattered and often empty. The crinkled map she had showed there should be some bridges close enough, but she couldn’t even make them out in the skyline. 

Her best bet was to walk toward where she knew they would be. The day was foggy and wet, and Arya pulled her jacket closer around herself. Through the fog, she could see a figure sitting on one of the docks. He had a chair and a coffee, watching the water. 

“Hey,” Arya called. 

The man turned and gave a brisk wave. His hair was greying, and his beard was almost white. He looked unintimidating, and when he stood up and walked closer, she felt a sense of peace in her chest. Her fingers didn’t need to bring the knife out, only twitch toward the hilt. 

“Is there something I can help you with, little lady?” It was strange how casual he looked. It was almost like he was prepared to go out for a day of fishing, not surviving in the aftermath of a plague. 

“I need to cross the water. Are the bridges to the East close?” 

The man shook his head slowly no. “During the thick of the plague they blew them all up. There was a lot of rioting and fighting coming from the North, and the city was trying to keep it out. It didn’t work, of course, but it sure as hell was crazy.” 

Arya felt unease rumble in her stomach. “So, I can’t cross anywhere? There has to be bridges intact somewhere.” 

“You’d have to follow the river to the West, actually. A few days out I heard word there are some bridges still in order, but I haven't been there.” He paused and held a hand up to his forehead, looking off into the fog. His eyes searched, and Arya followed his gaze to see what it was he was trying to find. “Your best bet is finding The Bull, though.” 

“The Bull?” she asked. Her eyebrows scrunched together, and she narrowed her eyes as if it might help find the mysterious something this man was looking for. “What’s that?”   
He gave up his search and turned back toward her. Taking a sip of coffee, he gave a little smile and continued. “A boat. Manned by a man, of course. Not too much further down the shore. If you have something worth giving him that makes wasting the gasoline on you worth it, he’ll cart you across the water.” 

“Thank you,” she said. It had been a while since she had said that or had cause to say it. “I don’t meet many sane people anymore.”

He shrugged, looking back out into the fog like it held something huge and unknowable. Arya wondered what he was looking for, or maybe he wasn’t looking for anything at all. Maybe he was hoping for something,  _ someone— _ to ride out from the fog like they had never been taken from him. She understood that.

“Just ‘cause the world is crazy, don’t mean we have to be shit, too,” he said gruffly. “Now get on. The fog is only going to get worse, and you best be on your way if you want to find The Bull.” 

Arya could kill him in a handful of seconds by throwing a blade straight into his heart.  _ She  _ was not sane. This world had chewed her up and, instead of spitting her out, she had  _ sliced _ her way out. It didn’t mean she had to be a monster, though. Not all ferocious things were born to kill. She left with a sad excuse for a smile and a wave. 

A half hour of walking later, she came across a tilted sign that said, in spray paint,  _ The Bull.  _ Arya kept her hand over her knife and walked down the pier, finding it longer than she expected. Finally, the figure of a boat appeared through the fog and overcast day. It swung with the water, knocking against the pier. 

“Hello?” she asked. Something clattered underneath the deck, and she grabbed the knife into her hand. “I need to get across.” 

Finally, a man appeared with a gun extended in his hand. For a second, all Arya could see was the muzzle, but then she looked past it and felt her chest constrict at bright blue eyes. The gun was brought down in a matter of seconds. 

“I see you finally got your gun,” she said to the silence. 

Gendry’s body was tight and frozen. He looked much the same as Arya remembered him—a little broader, hair a little shorter. Living near the water clearly made it easier for him to stay clean. Arya knew she must look dirty and wild to him. 

He held it up as if weighing it in his hand. “Still don’t know much how to use it.” He paused and set the gun back into his jeans. “Arya…”

Something clicked in her chest with the mention of her name. It was all it took to break the tension, and then she was jumping onto the boat and flinging herself at him. She came from a higher height, but he caught her in his arms with ease. Her feet dangled off the ground, and she wrapped her arms tightly around his neck. 

“I never should have let you go,” he said into her shoulder. 

“I probably shouldn’t have left,” she said. 

For a second, Arya closed her eyes and focused on the security of his arms wrapped around her back. It was easy to think she hadn’t touched someone like this in just months, but the truth was it was longer than that. She couldn’t remember ever huddling so tightly to someone before quite like this. Holding onto someone you thought you might have let go forever.

Her feet hit the ground, and she took a miniscule step back. 

“Probably?” he asked with a scoff and a soft smile. “You’re still as stubborn as always.” 

She shrugged. “Some things don’t change.”

“Guess not.” He ruffled a hand through his slightly shorter hair, and Arya smiled to see the uneven cut he had probably given himself. “I went looking for you, you know.” 

There were too many feelings roaming around in her chest, fighting and twirling, for her to understand how those words made her feel. Gendry had always been… well,  _ Gendry.  _ It was hard to define her feelings for him because they had always existed so differently than her feelings for everyone else. 

“I was…”  _ Unmade. A million different people and no one. Arya Stark.  _ She breathed deeply. “It’s a long story.” 

He nodded and moved to the steering wheel of the ship. “Well, we have a long time to talk, right? It’ll still take fucking forever to get to Washington.” 

Her fingers twitched, but not toward her knife. She wanted to reach out and make sure he really was real. She wanted to touch him to feel the heat of his life and the reminder of something she had been, no,  _ could  _ be. 

The words were a reminder of how they had started as nothing and became so much more. He was indispensable. They had told her to care for no one and nothing, but she looked at Gendry and thought about her family and it couldn’t be done. There was some things worth holding onto despite everything else. 

It was a terrifying thought. It was a beautiful thought. She hopped over to the wheel as he backed the boat out onto the open water. “Can I drive?” 

He laughed, and he looked down at her with a smile and a shake of his head. “I really don’t want to die crossing a river. You’ve endangered my life enough, don’t you think?”

She hit her shoulder with his. It felt easy. “Don’t speak too soon. You’re probably not out of the woods, yet.” 

His eyes lingered a little longer this time, and Arya could feel heat crawl up her spine. She licked her lips, and she noticed the way his eyes darted to them before looking back up where he was driving. “Well, life was getting a bit boring anyways. Only so many coffees you can have with Davos before you want to almost get killed with Arya Stark again.” 

“I missed you, too.” It was meant to be a joke, but it was obvious how truthful the words were. Gratefully, he didn’t look back to her. 

“Yeah.” He cleared his throat, maneuvering the boat to the right around a buoy. “Yeah.”

* * *

His hair wasn’t the only thing that had changed. When they docked the boat at the other side of the water, Gendry pulled out a newer, nicer hiking bag that was packed to perfection. 

“It’s good to be ready,” he said with a shrug when he noticed her eyeing it. 

“You’re just going to leave the boat?” she asked after they were settled. It bobbed up and down on the choppy waves, and there was something almost sad about it. A forgotten toy. Her hair felt sticky against her skin from the splash of water as they travelled. 

“Oh no, I was going to pack it up and put it in my bag.” Gendry halted and raised his brows. “Of course we’re leaving it behind. I’ve got the keys, it’s probably fine. If not—” He shrugged. 

It truly didn’t matter to him, she realized. A boat was nothing compared to going with her. She almost wanted to hug him again, but she wasn’t going to push the physical boundaries that already felt tenuous. Instead she turned around and began their trek. 

The silence that fell for the next stretch of walking wasn’t exactly  _ uncomfortable _ , but more or less misshapen. It didn’t fit the way it was supposed to. It used to be easier, but that was what distance did. Two people who had changed couldn’t interact the same way they used to. They'd have to find a new normal.

“I didn’t sleep with her,” he said. The words felt like a crack of thunder in the silence. 

“I don’t—”

He cut her off. His voice was serious and sharp. “Well if you did care, then. I didn’t.”

Arya nodded, dropping her gaze to her feet as she maneuvered through the fallen streets of the city. She couldn’t wait until they hit forest again. Being this open in the city made her feel uneasy, and there was something calming about feeling herself disappear into the foliage. 

When she looked up she could feel his eyes on the side of her face. After a breath, she turned toward him and raised a single brow. “She probably would have never looked at you twice, anyway.” 

He scoffed, and the smile that spread across his face made her stomach flip. The truth was she  _ had  _ looked at him twice, but Arya wasn’t going to get all  _ vulnerable  _ with Gendry. The thought of opening up like that left her shaky, and the littlest bit frustrated. 

“You didn’t replace me along the way?” he asked. It wasn’t bitter, just curious.

“Does it look like I replaced you?” She hoisted the backpack higher up on her back. “If I wa—” Her words cut off as someone appeared from an alley to their right, holding a gun up. 

Arya could sense Gendry eyeing the gun and contemplating how fast he could get to his own. Without a second more of thought, Arya moved for her knife and threw it straight at the man. He hadn’t even gotten a chance to speak a single word before the knife plummeted into his right eye and he fell to the ground with a thud. 

“What the fuck?” Gendry balked, turning toward her. He sputtered. “That’s new.” 

She walked toward the body, putting a foot on his chest and yanking the knife out. Giving it a look, she wiped the blood off on the dead man’s shirt. “A lot’s new.” She put the knife back into the holster on her thigh. “That okay with you?” 

He nodded with the twitch of a smile. “Yeah, that's okay with me.” 

* * *

It took until they were settled back around a fire for the conversation to finally come up. They were silent with the exhaustion that came from a long day—not just physically but emotionally. Gendry took a long chug of water before looking at her in the flickering light of fire.

“What happened to you? Where have you been? I thought you would have gotten to your brother by now.” 

She sucked in a breath. It wasn’t easy to answer. Not because it was painful (though some of it certainly was), but because she wasn’t entirely sure where to even start. Some of it felt so strange she still didn’t believe it herself. 

“A lot. Killing, walking, almost being killed. I trained in a house until I could hit a moving target with a blade, win in hand to hand combat with anyone. They called themselves the faceless men, and at first I thought it was because they made us forget who we were.” Arya paused, eyes transfixed on the flames. “They were killing everyone who came near them they couldn’t use, and they took their faces clean off. It was a cult, and I fell into it without even realizing. Truth was, I liked the darkness. It was simple.” 

“Doesn’t make you a monster,” Gendry said. It was the surety with which he said it. She could feel his eyes on the side of her face, and when she looked they were piercing. Strong and unquestionable. “You couldn’t be.” 

“You haven’t known me for a while,” Arya said with a small laugh, but it sounded self-deprecating. 

He shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. It’s hard to change the core of a person.” 

That made Arya’s palms sweat, and she didn’t want to decipher and sort through the feelings in her chest and the thoughts in her head, so she cleared her throat. “Where have you been? How did you get to your boat?” 

He sighed, seeming to deflate with the question. “I was only with the brotherhood for a little bit, but then the red woman she… She had crazy ideas. She thought there was something in my blood that could combat the plague, but the plague hasn’t appeared in anyone since the beginning. I had to escape in the middle of the night before she sliced me open.”

“Not quite the sex you imagined, yeah?” Arya joked, but it fell short coming out of her mouth. “And how did you get to Portland?” 

He shuffled on the ground and brought his hand to the side of his face, scratching at it uncomfortably. “I thought my best chance of getting back to you was somewhere you would have to go. And I figured, if I couldn’t get back to you I might as well do something that helps some people. The water was nice and served both purposes.” 

Arya wasn’t sure what to do with that, and today had already been so emotionally taxing. She set out her pack and laid on her side. Watching as he did the same, she thought about how easy it would be to reach out, but it wasn’t easy. Nothing about it besides the short distance really felt that easy. 

“Goodnight, Gendry.”

“‘Night, Arya.”

* * *

“Only if I can drive,” Arya said as they stared at the forgotten motorcycle lying on the side of the road. It was a bit scratched up, but Gendry had assured her he could get it up and running in no time at all.

“One of us has a motorcycle’s license, and it’s not you,” he said. He tilted the bike back up to look it over, taking her words as a yes. 

“Do you see a police officer anywhere?” she asked. 

He eyed her over the seat of the bike from his crouched position. “I don’t care about the  _ law.  _ I care about not dying in a fucking car crash after surviving literally everything else.”

She huffed. “Fine, but you have to teach me at some point.” 

“Some people ask nicely when they want things.” Gendry’s head was bent, and before Arya could come up with anything to say back the bike roared to life. He stood up with a smile that was so big it looked like it would break his face. “Think we can finally make it on the road?”

Arya swung her leg over and scooted back, making room for him in front of her. “Let’s hope there’s no road blocks. Or molotov cocktails for that matter.”

Gendry tied his bag to the back before sitting down in front of her. “Let’s hope. Hold on.”

Just as Arya’s arms wrapped around his middle, the bike pulsed into action. She wrapped a little tighter, and as the speed built, she screamed into the wind. It felt like being alive. She  _ felt _ alive. She screamed some more for the heck of it. 

* * *

After a day of driving down the major highways, only having to stop a couple of times, they pulled into a motel for the night. Arya was unsure of the idea, but Gendry convinced her with the allure of a real bed after days of sleeping on nothing but dirt.

He locked the door behind him, and they found some leftover water bottles in the decrepit mini fridge. It probably would have been sounder to save them for drinking, but they both wanted to wipe down after the last few days. After swapping shirts to a clean one Arya had been saving, she exited the bathroom to find Gendry already sprawled on the bed. 

One of his arms was behind his head, and it made his muscles bulge. He had stripped down to an undershirt, and Arya had almost never seen this much of him. Probably the last time was in the river. He smiled at her, a little sleepily, but he still seemed charged at the same time. 

There was another bed. She could easily slip between the sheets of it and ignore the empty space next to him, but she found she didn’t  _ want  _ to. The few feet between the beds felt like miles. She walked over and slid under the blanket, still keeping some distance between them. 

He twisted his body, one arm still underneath his head, but now he was on his side. His face was half in shadow, half in moonlight from the one window in the room. “Hey,” he said. 

“Hi.” It was almost a whisper. The moment seemed to require it. “As long as your bike doesn’t break down, we should make it tomorrow.” 

“Can you believe after all this time?” he asked. “Are you scared?”

She shrugged. “I need to know. It’s been killing me.”

He nodded in understanding, and then his eyes found her face again. This time a little more serious and with a twinge of something vulnerable. “What happens when we find Bran? Or the rest of your family?” He cleared his throat. “To me?” 

Arya scooted closer and brought a hand up to his strong jaw before cupping his cheek. The bed made it easier to reach his face, and she brought her forehead against his. They sat there, in silence, for a tender moment before she spoke. 

“You aren’t going anywhere. I’m not leaving you again.” 

He nodded into her. “Where you go, I go.” 

They were so close, and the words were too much, and Arya had never been this girl but she was starting to realize that what she had thought about types of girls had always been wrong. She was strong and fierce and could kill a man in a matter of seconds—and on top of that, she  _ loved  _ Gendry. All of it rolled into one complex person. She closed the gap between them and kissed him. 

His hand was on her waist instantly, and he wasted no time before returning the kiss. It was soft and exploratory for only a bit before more took over. It was hard to not kiss a person like the world was ending when it felt like it could at any moment. When he grasped into her hip a little tighter she pushed up to straddle him, barely separating their lips. 

She broke away to kiss at his jaw and his stubble, just because she could. His hands moved to her face and then her hair, and when she dove back to his lips he stopped her by kissing her neck. Then her collarbone. It was hard to get enough, to feel like they could kiss their feelings into each other. To explore every part of the other. 

“I love you,” he said with a laugh. “ _ Gods,  _ I love you.” 

She smirked and kissed him hard. He bit at her bottom lip, and she retaliated by teasing him with her tongue. When she pulled back she was beaming. “I love you too, you idiot.” 

“Always so sweet.” 

She fell onto him, holding him tightly, hiding her face in the crevice of his neck. “To you,” she said sweetly. She kissed him where the stubble ended and the soft skin started. 

He flipped her over and the two laughed, and they kissed. And by the time they fell asleep with red and puffy lips, they were so wrapped up in one another they weren’t sure where one of them ended and the other began. 

* * *

The school was so dead and empty, the only sound was the whistling of wind through the buildings. Arya couldn’t get over the fact that she was actually  _ there.  _ That after everything they’d been through she had  _ made it.  _ And not only that, but she made it with Gendry by her side. It was a warming fact.

Arya thought she was doing a fairly good job at retaining her exterior, but somehow Gendry picked up on the unease growing within her. He was always so good at that, and usually she would be grumpy about it, but today she was grateful. Even though holding hands meant she was a little slower in a fight, she grasped tightly onto his interlocked fingers. 

They hit each building as they came to it. She couldn’t remember which dorm building was his, but she knew he would be here. He had said he would, and Bran was not a liar. The question was whether he would be living or dead when she saw him next. 

“Look,” Gendry said with a nod at a nearby door. To anyone who wasn’t looking, it would have been nothing. Arya herself had almost missed it, but sprayed onto the concrete side of the building was the words— _ a wolf.  _ “It has to be him, right?”

“I can’t imagine it being anyone else.” 

The door was locked, but they shimmied through a nearby window. It was a dorm, and it reminded her so much of her own dorm when she had left it. Some rooms they passed were in complete disarray, others bizarrely untouched. She looked to her side at Gendry and his contemplative brow— _ how  _ much had changed since she'd left poor Beth in the hallway. 

They went up a floor after the first was empty, and as they got to the end of a long hallway they finally heard something in the distance. Arya’s heart beat furiously. She opened her mouth, trying to decide what exactly to say. 

“Hello?” a voice beat her to figuring it out. 

Arya and Gendry shared a look. After a nod of agreement, he picked the gun up just to be safe and her hand hovered over her favorite knife. The same knife she had picked up one of those first days her and Gendry had stopped at a superstore and stocked up. 

“We’re looking for Bran,” Arya said. 

A clatter and then footsteps as Bran stood a few feet in front of her. His hair a wild mess, his eyes even wilder as they searched her face. “Arya,” he said. 

Her hand pulled away from the knife and she jogged toward him, clasping him tightly to her. Her arms went around his middle, and she knew she must be hugging him almost painfully tight, but she didn’t care. He didn’t seem to mind, either. 

“You made it,” he said. 

She shrugged as she pulled back. “I said I would.” 

“Well, you did say you were going to come visit.” 

Arya giggled, and then when Bran laughed a little it set something off inside of her. She couldn’t  _ stop  _ laughing, and before she knew it there was water pooling at the corner of her eyes. She hadn't expected this feeling of absolute euphoria. __ Her whole body rattled with feeling. 

“Who’s this?” he asked, turning his eyes to Gendry. 

Unsure of what to do, Gendry stepped forward and awkwardly held out his hand. “I’m Gendry.”

“I’d say thanks for getting my sister here safe, but—”

“We know she didn’t need my help,” he finished for Bran. They both shared a smile, and Arya rolled her eyes. 

“He helped,” she said and stepped closer to this man she couldn’t even begin to thank. He’d helped keep her sane. He’d helped keep her alive. And when she thought she may have lost a part of herself he had showed up and reminded her exactly who she wanted to be. 

The darkness ate at her and the darkness lost. She had used it to sharpen her blade and her skill, but didn’t let it feast on her until it was full. She came out the other end stronger and more powerful. 

Gendry had made certain she didn’t forget what it was to love, and what it was to  _ be  _ loved. There had never been a moment in the  _ before  _ where she got to experience that. Even with the destruction of the end of the world, she had to be thankful for that. 

“Are you ready?” Arya asked, and she looped one of her arms through Gendry’s in a rare moment of over-sentimentality. 

“Do you have a place in mind? Because I was thinking—”

“Benjen’s cabin?” Arya asked. 

He blinked in brief surprise before laughing. “Exactly.” He leaned forward and kissed a grateful kiss on his sister’s forehead. “I have to do something in my room first.”

Arya nodded, and watched her brother jog back down the hallway. She knew she would have survived him being gone, but she was so  _ elated  _ she wouldn’t have to. Everything she had gone through was for the sake of him and for Gendry. 

Gendry took in a deep breath in and out, before turning toward Arya as they heard the dull sounds of Bran's activity in his room. “I have something to cross continents for now, you know that?” 

It was a sweet thought, and a slightly younger Arya probably would have laughed it off. Now, though, after everything… she couldn’t. “You’ve gotten rather sentimental,” she said. It wasn’t quite what she felt, but she needed to build up to it. She reached a hand up and ran her thumb along his jaw. 

“Life’s so short,” he said in reply, voice a bit softer. “I don’t want to waste time. I need you to know.” 

Arya had never been all that good at words, and the end of the world really hadn’t made her all that much better, but she liked to think she was good at action. She raised up onto her toes, brought her hands up to cup his cheeks, and kissed him soundly. 

After a beat he brought his arms around her back, lifting her off the ground. He pulled back and kissed her jaw. With a breath he set her back down to the ground, and she rested her forehead on his chest. 

“One of these days, we’re going to work on that whole talking about feelings things.” She could feel the reverberations of his words through his chest. 

Before looking up, she pressed a kiss into his chest. His smile was easy, and there was a light blush across his cheeks. He tucked a bit of hair behind her ear. She nodded in a delayed response to his statement. 

“We’ve got time,” she said finally.

His smile widened. “A lot of it. You know how fucking long it’s going to take to get to Canada?” 

Her head threw back with laughter, thinking about how far they’ve come, thinking about how far they had to go. The world felt better, though, and sounder than it had in a long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hopefully a better ending than last time? here's my tumblr where you're more than welcome to throw prompts at me: [clarkescrusade](http://clarkescrusade.tumblr.com/)


End file.
